Yosemite National Park

We set off for Yosemite National Park at around eight o’clock. I’m still dead tired. There’s a traffic jam at the entrance. And the roads in the park are also pretty full. To say it up front: quite disappointing overall. The Americans are a bit like the Catholics in medieval Germany. They have to build something in every beautiful place. Catholics built churches and Americans build golf courses. This is also the case in Yosemite National Park.

I drive up to Glacier Point, 3000 metres above sea level. The view is stunning: gleaming white mountains. During the ice age, the ice rubbed against them until the mountains were really cold, hence the colour.
I can see distant forest fires that are not extinguished here. Important for Sequoia seeds. Waterfalls like from Lord of the Rings. But at all points there are a hundred thousand tourists posing stupidly and shouting quite loudly. Would love to get away from the crowds, but the shortest trails here are 6 hours easy.

Down into the Yosemite Valley. At a road construction site, I’m obviously the only one to see a bear in the forest. Obviously, because there’s not even a 5km traffic jam in front of it. But the bear is gone before I can shoot it digitally. Yosemite Valley is horrible. Like Kleinwalsertal. Everyone has to get in, and once they’re there, they don’t know what to do. The roads are one-way, that’s how heavy the traffic is. Thousands of cars at the end of the valley, everything is completely overcrowded. And the Yosemite waterfalls have dried up. Let’s get out of here.

I pick up another hitchhiker who at least tells me about the beauty and solitude of the remote trails. I stop at a mountain lake at over 2000 metres and take a fresh dip in the crystal-clear water. The battery in Tom’s camera has finally run out, so I send business cards to all sorts of people to get some pictures by e-mail.

On the way home, I realise how schizophrenic Californians are. Scene 1: extremely winding mountain road. A solid centre line. The tyres are already squealing at 20 miles. For 50 miles, I don’t see anyone using the full width of the road when there’s a few hundred metres of visibility. Scene 2, motorway. 65 permitted, I’m doing 75. I’m constantly looking in the rear-view mirror because I’m afraid of being hit.

I take the last hills just in time for sunset. A thousand wind turbines turn in front of the setting sun. The radio says I’ll be happy here. Beck, Beastie Boys and Blur are playing. Britney and Beyonce have to wait outside. The alternative here is the masses, the mainstream. Wonderful.

I get my stuff from the youth hostel and drive up to the highest hill. This time I know where to ring the bell and Scott is there. The four boys live on the highest hill in San Francisco in a house built in 1928, a penthouse on the 7th floor. View of the Bay and Golden Gate. Huge, billiard parlour, Corinthian columns to the living room entrance and a painted wooden beamed ceiling like in a church. Simply unbelievable.

I drive Peter, Scott’s flatmate, to the airport, he’s going on holiday today. Traffic jams and speeding traffic bring them to the terminal 35 minutes before departure. Just in time. I get a bit lost on the way back, but it doesn’t matter. I’m exhausted. Home, upstairs, write, sleep.